Distractions and Diversions

Distractions and Diversions, sometimes abbreviated as D&D, is a classification of game features initially released by Jagex on 2 September2008. These game features are unlike normal minigames, as some of these games or events either move around RuneScape, have a limit on how often they can be played, or both. All 31 of the Distractions and Diversions are members-only.

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These events are usually used to divert the original intentions of the player, therefore a 'distraction' (as the name suggests). For example, if a player were to be training on werewolves in Canifis and then a shooting star lands near the bank, this could distract them from their combat training. Furthermore, these events could possibly be negative to those with strict training schedules.

Ancient effigies were released on 15 June2010. These require randomly selected non-combat skills (levels ranging from 91 to 97) to restore, rewarding a significant amount of experience in the skills used and a Dragonkin Lamp upon full completion of the effigy.

They do not require any specific levels to receive as a drop, and the assist system can be used if players do not have the required level in either of the two skills the Effigy requires. Each stage of the effigy has two different skills which can be used before passing onto the next stage.

There are four stages of effigies; each stage offers a choice of two skills at a given level to unlock it.

Effigies are always found in the "Starved" stage. After releasing its experience, its stage advances. After the Gorged effigy is satisfied the player receives a Dragonkin Lamp.

Each stage requires one of two given skills to be uncovered for its experience, one of the skills may be assisted, and one may not. After an Effigy is completely uncovered, it crumbles into dust, revealing a Dragonkin Lamp, which gives experience in any skill.

Historian Minas at Varrock Museum will take an effigy in exchange for a lamp that gives 5,000 experience to any skill over 50. This exchange is not recommended.

Circus barkers are found in each town mentioning the whereabouts of the Circus. To enter the Circus, players have to travel to the town (mentioned above) and find the Ticket vendor. The Ticket vendor will provide a Circus ticket, and players are transported into the Circus. To leave the Circus, they simply have to tear their Circus ticket. The destroy option also has the same effect. Note that the Circus moves to a different city every Wednesday, and the Ticket vendor can be found within the city area.

Whilst in the circus, players may test their skills and perform tricks in each of the areas: Agility, Ranged, Magic, Firemaking, and Thieving. The audience are key to earning maximum points, as they occasionally shout out tricks to perform. Players cannot do more than one performance in each area per week. This means that players, who have completed the Agility, Ranged, Magic, Firemaking, and Thieving performances have to wait for the following week in order to do it again. Circus barkers, who can be found in major cities, inform players where the circus currently is.

Players catch different soporith moths and feed them to the Plutonial chinchompa in the center of the area, putting the chinchompa to sleep. The D&D lasts either 20 minutes or until the chinchompa falls asleep. The player earns competence points that can either be spent on various Hunter-related items, Hunter experience or on a private area to catch certain creatures.

A recent update by Jagex now allows players with a high Hunter level to collect only the highest valued Grey, Purple and Black Soporith moths, making the maximum possible points obtainable 1,500 easier to achieve.

While fighting creatures of one of 13 'races', one may receive a Champion's scroll as a drop, which challenges the Player to a formal duel by the race's Champion. Champion's scrolls are extremely rare drops, making it quite difficult to duel all the Champions.

Larxus in the Champions' Guild Basement will instruct players about the Distraction and Diversion and will set up a match with a Champion when the player gives him a challenge Scroll. (The player must use the Scroll on Larxus, as just talking to him will not start the duel.) Until the match is started, the player can back out and decide to take the challenge another time.

The duels take place in the Champion's Challenge arena. They have certain rules, such as limiting the player's armour, disallowing some items, and prohibiting some forms of combat. Defeating the Champion will grant the player with equal amounts of Constitution and Slayer experience, as well as the possibility of duels with the Champions of Champions in the future.

After winning 10 challenges, the player will be challenged by the Human Champion of Champions, Leon d'Cour. After winning 13 challenges, the player will be challenged by the Gnome Champion of Champions, Glophren. While several other champions are present, watching the arena, only the Human and Gnome Champions will challenge the player. (Given that the 2009 update added lower champions for three additional races from the original ten and enabled a second champion of champion to issues challenges, many players expect future updates will expand the Distraction and Diversion, until all the Champions of Champions can issues challenges.)

Court Cases are a D&D released on 9 June 2010. This D&D requires the completion of King's Ransom and some other requirements. For the first case a Court Summons is not needed, but after your very first Court Case you will need a court summons obtained by killing certain NPC's, pickpocketing, and fishing. The reward is Attack or DefenceExperience. Which skill receives experience depends on whether the player is prosecuting or defending; they will receive either Attack or DefenceExperience respectively. Court Cases may also have additional rewards unique to each case, in the form of items or Emotes.

This D&D can only be performed once every two weeks. If a player receives a Court Summons within two weeks of their last trial, the summons will contain the message "please present yourself at court in X days". For example, a player receiving a summons two days after their last trial will see the message "Please present yourself at court in 12 days".

Demon Flash Mobs are the result of Zamorak and the incorporeal Zaros testing the boundaries of Gielinor by sending small flocks of demons forth. A demon mob spawns every 2 hours, and about half of them are in the Wilderness, where their loot is greater. Each mob consists of a demon boss and several minions (imp heralds, greater demons and black demons). All minions must be killed (weakest first, strongest last) before the boss can be damaged - if they take too long to be killed, the boss will devour them himself to heal and strengthen. Once all minions are killed, the boss will attack. He is extremely powerful and not to be underestimated - this D&D is designed for groups only. Once the demon is dead, he will drop some loot (better loot in the Wilderness), with a chance to receive demon slayer armour.

The Evil Tree can be attempted twice a day and helps players train their Woodcutting, Firemaking, and Farming skills, by chopping/burning it down, or nurturing the sapling. Waves of trees appear every two hours; between waves, no Trees will appear. To check if an Evil Tree is currently growing, a Spirit tree can be asked. It will also teleport you to it.

Players will see roots shoot out from the ground, giving a sign that the Evil Tree is sprouting and/or is nearby.

You do not need to bring anything with you, as you can store your hatchet and tinderbox in the toolbelt permanently. So if you see an Evil Tree and are a long way from a bank, there will be no need to go back.

Familiarisation is based on Summoning. Players will be summoned as a random familiar and will have to hunt around for Raw Shards. After that is done, return to RuneScape and claim a reward from Pikkenmix or Pikkupstix. They will offer a blessing which will triple Charm drops for a set time, or to receive some ingredients to use in infusing Summoning pouches in the means of a box.

This Distraction and Diversion features the Fishing skill. Located in Isla Anglerine, it involves participating in competitions and finding the best combination of bait, hooks, and weights to most efficiently catch the six different types of Fish there. There are no requirements or items needed. Players can start by talking to a Fisherman, who is located at Catherby's beach or in the Fishing Guild or outside Fishing Guild, and various other fishing spots around runescape. Rewards include Raw fish, Fishing experience, an xp boosting fishing outfit, and Tackle Boxes.

Goblin Flash Mob occur every 30 minutes. They consist of Hollowtoof leading a group of goblin raiders in plundering things like farms or mines. The goblins are no stronger than average goblins and the D&D is as such designed for low-levelled people. The goal is to kill all goblin raiders, receiving whatever they were looting as a drop, then take on Hollowtoof, who will drop a piece of raider equipment. After all goblins are defeated, a small Black Guard squad, led by Commander Yodri, will arrive. Yodri gives additional rewards, based on what the goblins were looting.

Players must build statues of various gods in return for Construction experience. God Statues may be completed once a month.

Five statues may be built each month in four separate locations around Gielinor. The locations of the statues are Taverley, Gu'Tanoth, Lumbridge, Canifis, and Prifddinas. Players must select who they wish their statue to represent. They can choose either Zamorak's K'ril Tsutsaroth, Saradomin's Zilyana, Bandos' Graardor or Guthix's Juna. Next, players must arrange the scaffolding around a large stone in the correct pattern to enable themselves to sculpt the statue. Players are rewarded with a construction experience reward for successfully completing each statue.

Depending on whether locals approve of the god depicted in their nearby statue, players can also receive either a prayer or slayer experience reward. Should a player's chosen statue satisfy local residents, they are able to pray at the statue gaining prayer experience. Whereas should the player's chosen statue anger locals, an aggressive Fanatic will appear. The fanatic's combat level increases depending on the difficulty of the statue. Once the fanatic has been killed, the player will receive a slayer experience reward.

This is a Divination-themed Distraction and Diversion. It requires the player to hop into an Energy Rift, found at any of the wisp colonies (except the Pale wisp colony) which appear for 10 minutes at 3 hour intervals, to collect memories of Guthix. It requires no skill requirements to start. Up to 100 points can be collected per game, with a total limit of 200 points each day. There's no limit to how many games that can be played however.

Larry can be asked for clues as to the whereabouts of each penguin either by talking to him or contacting him through the lunar spell NPC Contact. Upon finding a penguin, the 'Spy on' option can be used to log the details into the notebook and earn penguin points. Return to Larry for the rewards.

The spy notebook automatically records all of the penguins that have been spotted, as well as how many penguin points the player currently has. Despite this function, the notebook does not need to be carried in the inventory in order to earn penguin points.

The regions of the penguins are the same for all worlds, but will change every week (and the specific location of a penguin varies from world to world). Chat-based and Thread-based hunting are two different methods for obtaining help in finding penguin locations. The respective threads can be found in the Distractions and Diversions section of the official RuneScape forums.

After completing the quest Hunt for Red Raktuber, a polar bear, Chuck, replaces Larry as the source of clues and where to turn in penguin points. With the completion of the quest, players also have the option to spy a stationary polar bear hiding in a well for an extra point. The bear changes its location once per week on the same time-frame as penguins.

Furthermore, after completing Some Like it Cold, you can hunt for a ghost penguin that is very elusive. A ring of visibility is required in order to see the ghost.

The Phoenix is an Ancient, practically immortal creature capable of endlessly renewing herself under the correct conditions. The last Phoenix known to still exist is determined to live a very long life, and asks whichever Adventurer has saved her to return regularly for battle, so that she may repeat her death and rebirth cycle.

Of course, the Phoenix must be sure that its opponent is worthy, and so its reborn guardians will do their very best to hinder anyone they come across.

Players will have to complete In Pyre Need in order to do this. To kill the Phoenix, they will also need 51 Slayer.

While training your non-combat skills, you may occasionally receive a Strange rock. Visit Varrock Museum to have the stones appraised and you will discover that these are parts of the statue of Dahmaroc; a mage who was turned to stone during a duel and whose cursed remains have been scattered across the world.
Initially, you will only be able to obtain 2 rocks from any particular skill. When you have received the first rock for a skill, the drop chance for the second will be reduced by half. Once you have received two rocks from practicing a skill you will receive no more from that skill until the Statue is rebuilt entirely.
Actions that can yield a rock include those in the main article. It's a good idea to mix up your training; perhaps try out a new skill in which you've yet to dabble. Completing the statue also rewards the player with an item that will allow them to either build or add pieces to the statue in your POH.

This Distraction and Diversion is themed on Dungeoneering. Players can participate twice per day. Every hour on the half hour, a sinkhole appears in a location in Gielinor. By entering it, players in a group of 5 race to raid a dungeon looking like those in Daemonheim for resources. This may involve skill activities like Mining, Woodcutting, Fishing, Farming and combat with monsters inside dungeon rooms. The more a player raids, the greater the reward they receive. The Gorajo hoardstalker sitting inside sinkholes would provide more information on the game play and to start the game as well.

A twist in rewards is the use of summoning familiar cards. Each card gives a special effect that may swap with, copy from or add into players' rewards. The rewards may be in the form of Dungeoneering experience, Dungeoneering tokens, or a cosmetic Hoardstalker outfit.

There are no requirements for this D&D. The location of sinkholes can be checked from Talsar in Daemonheim, who offers teleports thrice per day.

Players receive 0.6 seconds inside the cave to collect tears for every Quest Point they have, up to a maximum of 180 seconds with 300 or more Quest Points. When the lowest level skill is at least 30, the player receives 60 experience for each tear collected. Below level 30, players receive 50 XP each, but there may be a lower limit. The XP gained per tear is not related to the quest points a player has, although more tears can be collected with more quest points.

Treasure Trails is one of the Distractions and Diversions available to Members in which a player follows a series of clues to get a reward. The value of rewards can range from about 100 coins to over 140 million coins, but more commonly is between 10,000 and 3 million coins. Level 1 clue scroll rewards range from as few as 100 coins to 7.5 million coins. Level 2 clue scroll rewards range between 2,000 coins to 28 million coins. Some players choose to do treasure trails to make money, due to the chance of getting an extremely valuable item. A treasure trail is started by finding a clue scroll. Clue scrolls are randomly dropped by various monsters and give the player his or her first clue to follow. For a list of clue-dropping monsters, please see List of clue scroll dropping monsters. Players will only receive a new clue scroll if he or she does not already have one in his or her inventory, bank, or Kingdom Management resources. Clues can involve following maps, solving puzzles, finding coordinates, talking to various NPCs, and fighting monsters. After the treasure trail is completed, the player receives a reward.
Most unique rewards (with some notable exceptions) can be placed in the treasure chest in the costume room of a player's house.

Level 1 trails can be between 1 and 5 clues long with little or no quest requirements.

Level 2 trails can also be between 1 and 5 clues long with some quest requirements.

Level 3 trails can be between 4 and 8 clues long, with multiple enemies to defeat and high-levelled quest requirements.

Level 4 trails can be between 5 and 10 clues long as well, with high-levelled enemies to defeat and often many quest requirements.

Troll Invasion is a Distraction and Diversion in which players attempt to defeat trolls in Burthorpe. This can be done either through fighting or skilling. If fighting, waves of trolls come down the hills, getting progressively more difficult. In the regular version there are 20 waves, and in the hard version there are 7. If skilling, the gatehouse must be maintained for the soldiers. The ballista must be tended to, the oil vats refilled, and the barricades repaired. If the trolls are stopped for ten minutes, they will depart. The reward is a reward book, which gives experience in any skill. The reward is given after the first time playing per month; subsequent plays will not result in a reward.

Triskelion Treasures is a Distraction and Diversion where players piece together a Crystal triskelion using parts obtained by killing Vorago or high level slayer monsters (requiring a slayer level of at least 80), and from certain high level skilling activities, which is then used to locate a rock face to claim your treasure.

The Pit is a Distraction and Diversion in which players play various minigames relating to Agility, in order to gain agility experience.

By completing a lap on an agility course, players may attract the attention of the Talent scout, and may then choose to go and talk to him to participate in a challenge run by Snotgut and Scrambles. Completing the challenge successfully for the first time yields a gorilla mask. Each participation in The Pit is rewarded by agility experience, amount dependent on the agility course, challenge received, and whether the challenge was completed successfully or not. The Talent scouts' attention can only be caught once an hour.

The Wilderness Warbands are groups of followers of particular gods having set up a storage camp in the Wilderness. They play a role in this dangerous D&D where people kill the followers and loot their camp and deliver it to an ent Quercus and gain a vast amount of experience or a large sum of money.